John_Lackey's Blog

03
May
The Gatorade Commercial

Have you seen the Gatorade commercial I'm in? I finally saw it a few days ago. The whole thing was set up through our front office. It's not like I tried out for the part. I'm on the mound and Derek Jeter's on first trying to steal. Garrett Anderson is playing first base, Howie Kendrick is at second and Shea Hillenbrand is in there too. Derek is a great guy. I've hung out with him a few times. He's fun to be around. I met Harvey Keitel right before the shoot. He was the big time guy with the big trailer. We never saw him between takes. He was chillin' in the trailer while we all just hung out. He had a double when they were lining up each shot so he literally came out only when it was time to shoot. It was a great opportunity to be in a national commercial like that, but it took forever to shoot. We did it over two nights and the shoots were 4-5 hours each. I definitely had no idea how much work goes into making a 45 second commercial. You would literally do something for a few seconds and then they'd move all the lights and the people in the stands. They had to shoot from every angle so you were always stopping and setting up. I don't think acting is going to become a second career for me, but that's probably ok with everyone.
18 Comments
30
Apr
Preparing for the Royals

Kansas City has some good young talent this year. They're definitely putting the pieces together. Dejesus, their leadoff man, is a really good player. I always keep an eye on Jeff Weaver and they beat him up pretty good yesterday. There's no question I'm going to have to pitch well for us to win tomorrow night. Tonight, I'll just spend some time in my room going over the Royals lineup in my head, visualizing what they look like in the box and how my pitches look against those guys. I do that the night before all of my starts. This helps me get mentally prepared for the scouting meeting tomorrow at the park. When I first get to the stadium, I'm actually pretty laid back. I like to take it easy, but as the game gets closer I start to get more and more focused. I get really locked in about 30 minutes before the game. I grab a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a couple of Red Bulls and I'm ready to rock. That's a big part of my routine. I actually stole the peanut butter and jelly thing from Darin Erstad. He used to have two of them before every game. I can't do two of those, just one. The Red Bulls, that's all me. After the sandwiches and Red Bulls I get stretched out by the trainers, take a couple of advils and I'm ready go.
17 Comments
29
Apr
Jered Comes Through

Even though Jered has had a rough start to the season, nobody's been concerned about it. Every pitcher has some tough starts and we knew he would bounce back. Look what he did last night. He shut down the White Sox and they have a really good lineup. Jr. hit a homerun in the first and that got everyone's confidence up and really got us rolling. A lot of the time when you're starting, you kind of feel your way through the first couple of innings, trying to figure out what's working. By the second or third inning, you find your groove. That's when you could see it with Jered last night. He threw a lot of good changeups early and that's really key for him. He's got a lot of good pitches, but when he's got his change, it gets a lot of guys off balance. He did a great job and so did Shields. You could tell early in the 7th when Shields came in that he hadn't been out there in a while. He got a couple of his pitches up, but corrected it quickly and started getting his pitches down in the zone. It was typical Shields. No question it was a big win for us. These are the kind of teams we need to beat if we're going to get to where we want to go. Our expectations are high. We want to win a World Series and they have the same expectations which makes it was a good win for us. We'll try to get another one today. Escobar is pitching and I'm charting all of his pitches. It's my turn. Usually when you're charting it will help you for your next start, but since we're playing Kansas City tomorrow and not Chicago again, it won't help me all that much. Charting Escobar is a tough job. He's got a lot of pitches.
3 Comments
27
Apr
Easing Into Chicago

We are playing pretty well right now and hopefully we will continue that in Chicago. I mentioned the other day how big it was getting Vlad back. He just does so much for our offense. A lot of our success is built on our pitching and defense but it makes it a lot easier when Vlad is in the lineup and we're scoring runs. We did a lot of that during the homestand. The trip here was smooth. We got in pretty late, after midnight, so I just grabbed a little pizza and had a few beers at the hotel just to settle in. Real low key. I'm sure we'll get out on the town tonight. Chicago is such a great city. I'm sure we'll find something to do after the game tonight. Today is my bullpen day. I do it the second day after I pitch. Usually it's 10-12 minutes throwing off the mound, working on the things I need to work on, stuff that I didn't think went well in my previous start. I also work on my location. I don't throw many breaking balls during bullpen because it's hard on the arm so I throw mostly fastballs and change ups. I try to get my workouts in before we take batting practice. We stretch for BP at 4:30 when we're home and 5:20 on the road so I'll be at the stadium at 3:00 today. I workout every day and the day after I pitch is always the hardest day. I'll run for 30 minutes to get a sweat and help get the soreness out. I do upperbody after I pitch so yesterday was bench, lat pulldowns, curls, you know the regular upperbody lifting exercises. Then I do what we call the Jobe Program, it's five or six exercises to strengthen the shoulder. It's all light weight stuff that focuses on the rotator cuff. I've been doing that for awhile. Today I'll do legs and long sprints on the treadmill. You go hard for 30 seconds then walk for 30 seconds and keep repeating it for 20 minutes. When I'm done working out I'll go out for BP and shag some balls. The when we come back out I'll grab a seat and take in a ball game.
4 Comments
25
Apr
The Return of Vlad

It's absolutely huge having Vlad back. It was no secret we were struggling to score runs for a little while there. He just makes our lineup so much deeper and it's more than just hitting with him. He came up big today scoring from third on a wild pitch. Having him back makes a big difference. Look at the spark he provided against Seattle. He was killing it and guys can't even pitch around him. It's impossible because he swings and hits everything, balls, strikes, it doesn't matter. Really, that's one of the reasons he gets hit a lot. Pitchers go inside and make a mistake. Opponents know they have to pitch in on him if they are going to have a chance to get him out. He gets nicked sometimes because of that. Our pitchers have to throw inside too in order to protect him. I'm not saying we're throwing at guys. We just have to establish that we're going to pitch inside so that when they pitch in on Vlad they're not reckless. He really is amazing. The guy takes four days off and returns to the plate like nothing ever happened. In his first at bat back, he hit a bullet up the middle that nearly killed the pitcher. It's no coincidence that our offense started turning around when he came back.
8 Comments

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The Gatorade Commercial

Preparing for the Royals

Jered Comes Through

Easing Into Chicago

The Return of Vlad

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